Tag Archives for " speed "

5 Developing Great Foot-work with the use of Foot-Speed and Coordination Exercises - Part 2

By Justin Cresser Author of Total Soccer Conditioning: A Ball Orientated Approach

In last week’s article we spoke about the importance of developing foot speed and coordination in our players. We highlighted the need for these qualities by wing backs for example, who need to be able to jockey and defend fast wingers in 1 v 1 situations. Fast and coordinated footwork are also necessary for attacking players trying to dribble their way past one or two defenders, or for goalkeepers that constantly have to move across the face of the goal as the ball is passed around inside their penalty box.

Last week we presented a basic footwork exercise that can be used earlier in the season or by younger players that are being introduced to this type of training for the first time. However, as your players advance into the season or become comfortable with the basic exercises, it is important that you progress to more complex footwork exercises to continuously challenge and develop your players. The following is a more advanced footwork exercise that you can use:

Set-up and Directions: Divide your players into pairs. For each group, set up four small cones so that they make a diamond shape. The length of each side of the diamond must be 1.5 yards. Have a player stand on one leg in the centre of the diamond facing their partner who is standing 2 yards away from the top cone. The player on the outside should have a ball in their hands (Figure 1).

When ready, instruct the player standing on one leg to hop to the top cone and then

1 Speed of Reaction and Developing Anaerobic Capacity

By Justin Cresser Author of Total Soccer Conditioning: A Ball Orientated Approach

Individual and Small Group Defending; Dribbling to Beat and Opponent; Speed of Reaction and Developing Anaerobic Capacity

Today’s activity focuses on a number parameters, including individual and small group defending; 1 v 1 attacking; speed of reaction; and anaerobic endurance. It is an exercise I like to use during the competitive or in-season as it allows me to ‘kill many birds with one stone’.

Set-Up and Directions:
Divide your players into groups of 4 (or 8) and set up the following station for each group: Create a grid 20 yards wide and 20 yards long. Place a small goal (1.5 yards wide) on each side of the grid so that the goals are in line with the centre of the area. Have one player stand beside each goal with a ball at their feet. Give each player a different number between 1 and 4 (Figure 1).

When ready, the coach will call two numbers. The first number called will be the attacker and the second number called will

0 Teaching Three Types of Turns, Improving Speed Dribbling Technique, and Developing Anaerobic Capacity

By Justin Cresser, Author of Total Soccer Conditioning: A Ball Orientated Approach

Turning away from your marker, while dribbling at speed, is an essential quality for both midfielders and attackers who have little time and space when in possession of the ball. Today’s activity teaches players three types of turns and focuses on being able to perform these turns while dribbling at a fast pace. The structure of the exercise also allows your players to develop their anaerobic endurance, a component of fitness that allows players to perform repeated high intensity actions throughout the duration of the game.

Set-up and Directions: Divide your players into groups of three (or four) and set up the following station for each group: Place two pylons 20 yards apart. Have two players stand at one pylon (one of these should have a ball) while the third player stands at the second pylon. Place two small cones in between the pylons so that the small cones are ten yards apart, but each cone is 5 yards away from the closest pylon (Figure 1).

Play is initiated by the player with the ball dribbling at speed towards the small cone that

0 Developing Stop-and-Go-Ability along with Short Passing and Receiving Technique

By Justin Cresser - Author of Total Soccer Conditioning: A Ball Orientated Approach When focusing on the overall agility development of your players, one of the major factors to consider is stop-and-go capability. This component of agility involves the ability to rapidly accelerate and decelerate in a variety of directions and after performing various actions.

0 Soccer Science: In-Season High-Intensity Interval (Speed Endurance) Training Improves the Ability to Perform at a High Work Capacity

By Justin Cresser Welcome to the July-August issue of Coaching Soccer Conditioning’s Soccer Science; where we present the latest findings from Sports Science research in soccer, and discuss how these findings may influence the way we train we our players. ARTICLE TITLE: Today’s featured article is entitled: ‘Effect of Additional Speed-Endurance Training on Performance and

0 Using Short Sprints to Develop Starting Speed and Acceleration as well as Cutting Technique

By Justin Cresser For many coaches, speed is considered to be one of the most important predictor’s of soccer performance. Indeed, one of the first things that come to mind when doing tryouts is speed assessment. In today’s activity, we are focusing on developing starting speed and acceleration. These components of speed are especially important

1 Speed Training Exercises

We all have such limited time to impact the technical, tactical and physical abilities of our players that finding ways to integrate each of these into our training sessions is very important. If we were training four or five times a week we could afford to practice them in isolation but most of the coaches reading this won't have that luxury.

0 Game Speed Testing – Testing with a Purpose

Today's post is from Scott Moody, our Soccer Conditioning Expert at the Soccer FIT Academy. This blog post got my attention because I've had many conversations with parents and other coaches on this subject. There are an ever-increasing number of, 'Speed and Agility' trainers, camps and businesses. But all to often they are not soccer

2 Pass and Sprint with Half-Turns and Speed Dribbling

By Justin Cresser

No matter what phase of the season we are in, I always include an activity that focuses on improving my Players’ first touch. I think this is extremely important, especially at the youth level.

The following is an exercise I like to use during the competition phase at it emphasizes several components of soccer conditioning. It incorporates short sprints, anaerobic conditioning, agility, and it also develops a player’s first touch. You can also use it as a warm-up routine.

Divide your players into groups of 4. Each group will have 2 working players and 2 non-working or passing players. For each group of 4, set up the following station:

Place two large ones 30 yards apart in a straight line. Have a non-working player stand at each cone with a ball at their feet. Place two small cones in between these two large cones so that they are 10 yards apart and each small cone is 10 yards away from one of the larger cones. Have a working player stand at each of these small cones facing the non-working player closest to them (Figure 1).

On the coach’s signal, the passing players will play a ball into space that the

1 Functional Training of the Centre Midfielder: Change of Direction, Half-turns and Speed Dribbling

By Justin Cresser

As your players advance and begin to play at higher levels, they will need some degree of Functional or Position-specific Soccer training. For example, wingers need to be good dribblers and crossers of the ball and should therefore devote time to perfecting these skills. In a similar fashion, central defenders need to be strong in the air and proficient in 1 v 1 situations. The same is true for conditioning. Players in the various positions will have specific conditioning needs and coaches should allocate some time to developing position-specific fitness needs.

Most of the exercises we present on this website are general fitness exercises, in that; they are suitable for every player on the team, regardless of position. This week and every so often however, we will look at position-specific conditioning exercises. Today’s activity is geared towards the central midfielder, but strikers and wingers can also benefit from the drill.

Center mids are often called upon to create space between themselves and their marker, check back to receive a pass played to their feet and in one motion, turn and attack the space in front of them. This sequence of movements is frequently seen with passing midfielders that play in front of the back four, such as Real Madrid’s Xavi Alonso, and requires good agility as well as proper turning and receiving technique.
Divide your players into groups of two. For each pair, set up 3 cones 12 yards apart in a straight line. Have yours players stand at each of the end cones facing each other. One of them should have a ball at their feet (Figure 1).

When ready, the player without the ball will run to the right of the cone in the centre. When they reach midway between this cone and their

4 Developing the Ability to Shield the Ball from an Opponent while Improving Anaerobic Endurance and Repeated Sprint Ability

By Justin Cresser

I was watching the El Classico game over the weekend and it was a fantastic game. Although we most frequently talk about Barcelona’s ability to pass and move, another thing the players do so well is to protect the ball from pressuring defenders in tight spaces. In today’s exercise we will work on improving the ability to shield the ball from an opponent while developing anaerobic endurance and repeated sprint ability.

Set up a 15 yard by 15 yard playing area (it may be smaller or larger depending on numbers). With the exception of 2 to 3 players, give each individual a ball and instruct them to dribble around inside the playing area using small touches. Have the players without a ball stand on the edge of the playing area wearing a different colour bib (Figure 1). These are your pressuring defenders. You will want a ratio of approximately 1:4 defenders to dribbling players.

When ready, the coach should direct the defenders to sprint inside the playing area and try to

0 Recovery Runs, Counter Attacking, Acceleration and Speed Endurance

By Justin Cresser

There are times when attacking teams are deep in their opponent’s half, but are keeping possession with the players at the back. However, if the ball is lost at the back from a poor pass or a player trying to beat an opponent off the dribble, this can be very problematic as the team that lost the ball is likely to be spread out in an attempt to provide width, and therefore out of position.

When this happens, defenders have to recover as fast as possible over a great distance and therefore require good speed endurance; whereas attackers need to make rapid decisions in terms of passes and movement off the ball and therefore acceleration and speed of reaction would be beneficial qualities to have.

Today’s activity mimics the situation described above and will involve 3 attackers counter attacking against 3 defenders and a goalie. You will need half of a regular-sized playing field for you playing area. Place two cones at the halfway at the points where the centre circle intersects the line. Place a third cone on the half way line 5 yards in from right side line. Have a player stand behind each of these cones. These will be your three attackers.

Set-up another 3 cones where your recovering defenders will start. Place a cone i) 5 yards behind the cone on the halfway line near the right touchline; ii) on the bottom edge of the centre circle so that it is in line with the centre of the goal; and iii) 5 yards in from the left touch line and 5 yards in front the half-line (Figure 1). Note: the defender on the centre circle must start facing away from goal.

Play starts with the coach playing a firm ball towards the corner flag in the top, right-hand corner of the field (for the right winger to run unto). As soon as this happens,

5 Integrating Ball Control with Acceleration, Agility and Repeated Sprint Ability

By Justin Cresser During the competitive season, the main conditioning goal is maintenance of fitness levels established in the pre- and off-seasons. With technical and tactical exercises a top priority, it can sometimes be difficult to include activities for all the different fitness components. I like to include the following (and similar) exercises in my

4 Testing to Evaluate Player Ability and Development

As a coach I'm always evaluating my players but mostly on a subjective level. I do some 1v1 and 2v2 statistical evaluations that I wrote about in a previous post but that's the only objective information I've used to in the past.

This spring our club has implemented the SoccerFIT Game Speed Assessment for all of our teams. The test looks at three specific categories - Speed/Agility, Soccer Fitness and Technical Skill. The ideal situation is to see a balance between these unique areas but in most cases players will be stronger in one or two and weaker in the others. Here's an example of a report that you would receive after entering your data from the tests:

There are 15 different test

2 Agility, Sprinting and One-Touch Passing

Here is a simple activity that works on agility, sprinting and one touch passing.  This uses L shaped movement with passing

Start with 7 cones making up and L (or a reverse L) and 3-4 players to the side.  Two players start 10 yards from the last cone with 1 ball.

The first player in line “slaloms” through the cones sideways and then forward until getting to

2 Soccer Agility, Lateral One Step and Sprint

Lateral movement forms a major part of speed during soccer, specifically during ball control. If a player possesses the skill of moving laterally, then opponents can be avoided. It is highly beneficial to forwards who need to make repeated runs with lateral movement in between. Here is an exercise that will help to improve speed and balance while changing direction: Lateral One Step and Sprint.

Purpose:

-        To teach athlete to maintain speed and balance, while

1 Attacking With Speed

Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity works on attacking at speed.  There are many other options to try with this activity and you can find others in the book Improving Your Teams Speed of Play.

Start with a 40 x 25 field with 2 full sized goals and a keeper in each goal.  There is a midfield line and 3 attackers and 2 defenders in each half.

If the yellow team starts with the ball it would be 3 v 2 going to goal.  The black team defends and if either

0 Agility and Perception

All too often coaches train agility with their athletes simply by running pattern-based drills with ladders, dots, cones or lines. And although this is a necessary tactic in teaching pattern movement, it quickly loses it value once the players understand where they need to go. The player’s focus is isolated on getting to the cone by reaching with the foot or hand. Their vision is focused on the cone or line where they lose the athletic feel of the pattern, and when this happens the drill loses its effectiveness.

In reactive-situational agility we do not want the player focused on moving to a spot on the field, and we certainly do not want them

1 Integrating Quick Feet with Ball Skills

In our weekly summer camps at the SoccerFIT Academy we structure each day with a specific focus and then approach each day with an effort to:

1. Broaden the players understanding of the athletic aspects required to perform that specific skill
2. Integrate the ball into these foundational movements to bridge the gap between athletic movement and athletic skill
3. Apply these skills in small-sided games (SSG’s) and fitness activities that allow players to attempt these skills at speed in specific situations.
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0 Play Fast But Don't Rush

Play fast but don’t rush. To some it might seem contradictory to say play fast but don’t rush but for me, this is one of the things that separates good players from great players. A good player plays full speed.  As soon as the ball comes to him he tries to get rid of it

4 Should we judge players based on their size or Speed

Should we judge players based on their size?  How about their speed?  What about their juggling ability. One effective way to judge players is based on their TIC Technique Insight Communication A player can be in the right spot at the right time and know what to do but without the technical ability to execute,